WITHOUT "TETAS" THERE'S NO TITLE, BUT ONLY IN SPANISH

Sin Tetas No Hay Paraíso, based on the book authored by Colombian investigative reporter Gustavo Bolívar, tells the story of siblings Catalina and Byron, who chose the paths of prostitution and sicariato (paid hit man) to escape from poverty. Both paths are inextricably linked to narco traffic. This mini-series (I think it's too short to be called a telenovela) was originally produced by  Caracol in Colombia. Sin Tetas is a  show with a clear lesson dispensed after its "The End:" 



Translation: One may think that just by being pretty or by having a gun you can reach paradise. That money makes you somebody, that a kiss is a coin, and a checkbook is a hug. That to study is a waste of time. As if becoming a prostitute and becoming someone else's merchandise, or living from killing others, were better than finding an honest job. The truth is that to be somebody in life, you don't have to be rich. To be somebody is to be, increasingly, owner of our own destiny. To read, write, substract, add, to study, to understand. To be able to fly and be proud of ourselves, of the struggles and triumphs that we have lived through without damaging others. The truth is that to be somebody in life you need to love, love yourself and be loved. To be somebody you don't need to elicit envy because you have money. No, to be somebody means to walk straight with your head up and without the need to hide. It means too live without nightmares and to be able to sleep soundly. The truth is that one can believe that just by being pretty, of by having a gun, you can reach paradise. But, money isn't paradise. And for paradise there aren't any shortcuts.

In similar fashion as the case of Yo soy Betty, la fea, the international market has fallen in love with this story, which has been broadcast in many countries. Its rights have also been acquired to produce several remakes. Each country that has broadcast Sin Tetas, or one of its remakes, has had to decide whether to leave the title unchanged or not since the word "tetas" ("tits") is considered vulgar in several Spanish-speaking cultures. For example,  here's a promotional for the series in Puerto Rico. The word "tetas" is never said. In its place, there's a graphic:



Here, in the United States, Telemundo (owned by NBC) bought the rights for Sin Tetas No Hay Paraíso with the idea of producing it in Spanish with English sub-titles for the Spanish-speaking and English-speaking audiences.

How do you handle the title of this novela when Latinos in the United States come from a number of countries in which the acceptance of the word "tetas" varies? 

What title do you use in English? "Without Tits, There's No Paradise"? Or, "Without Breasts, There's No Paradise"?

Look at the teaser from Telemundo productions. It's narrated in English and uses English sub-titles:



In this teaser, we can read the title in Spanish,  "Sin Tetas No Hay Paraíso" without the narrator ever saying it (0:51). At the end of the teaser, (2:40) author Gustavo Bolívar, himself says: "Llámalas como las quieras llamar, pero ya basta de tabúes. Tetas son Tetas y ya". The sub-titles read:  "No more taboos! 'tetas' are 'tetas'". In this way,  "tits" (a word that I don't think is acceptable for the average U.S. network television viewer) is never mentioned. The word "tetas" is shown and said only in Spanish, while the author instructs Spanish-speaking audiences to dispose of the "taboo" associated with the word "tetas."

It's going to be really interesting to follow the case of Sin Tetas No Hay Paraíso in the United States. 

TELENOVELAS: WHEN THERE IS NO COMPETITION

Last week we read the publication of the shares of Venezuelan television for the month of October:

Venevisión: 58,1%
Televen: 21,0%
VTV: 6,3%
Globovisión: 6,0%
RCTV International: 4,4%
Tves: 4,1%

Source: AGB. Medición nacional. Total televidentes ABCDE de 6 a 12am. Octubre 2007.

In the message board of Television Venezolana e Internacional (TVVI), the reactions (1, 2) have centered mainly on:

* The fact that, even though it is now on cable only, RCTV International, has a bigger share than the government channel that took over its frequency, TVES.

* Whether Venevisión has capitalized the absence of RCTV. In other words, whether it has increased its share now that RCTV is only on cable.

Since I'm completely opposed to the way the government did away with the opposition that RCTV represented (see my posts 1, 2 and 3), I'm happy that RCTV International has a better share than TVES.

As for Venevisión, the network has benefitted from RCTV's absence. Following are the approximate shares during April this year, (RCTV was closed at the end of May):

Venevisión: 35-40%
Televen: 10-15%%
VTV: 5-6%
Globovisión: 2-3%
RCTV: 23-28%

We should note too that both Televén and Globovisión have also increased their shares in the post-RCTV era.

However, and even though ratings and shares are the currency of the television business, I'm concerned tha the lack of competition will change the way television is made in Venezuela.

I'm particularly concerned about telenovelas. I worry that without internal competition, telenovelas will be produced with the sole purpose of international sales. We are seeing it already. Ciudad Bendita, my last case study, is probably the last telenovela broadcast by Venevisión which was designed to win the ratings war in Venezuela. As for RCTV International, it is now co-producing with Telemundo in order to survive and be sure of its international sales. I'm not sure yet what form their productions will take. The first one, Toda una Dama, a fair remake of the extraordinary telenovela Señora originally written by José Ignacio Cabrujas, has a cast in which talent is uneven.

I'm concerned that as priority is given to international sales over local success (which doesn't matter anymore given the lack of competition), Venezuelan telenovelas will lose their local color and flavor. Many believe that there is nothing wrong with this. Furthermore, they think that this is exactly what the Venezuelan industry needs to regain the top place it occupied once in the international market. I disagree. Firstly, because the political economy of the international telenovela business is different to the one that was in place when Cristal and Kassandra conquered the world. Today the global market is dominated by remakes and telenovelas that are both short and formulaic. There is no risk-taking these days. Secondly, because in Venezuela telenovelas and the social formation have a particularly strong dialogic relationship. Without losing the universality of melodrama, telenovelas have spoken to us, Venezuelans, about who we are, how we love and how we stop loving. If we take away the local flavor, we will be closing this important dialogue between television and culture, and we will diminish the space for autoanalysis. We will also ascertain that our local culture isn't good enough to be present in the international arena.

There was a time in which we enjoyed listening to the different accents, words and sayings present in the telenovelas of varied countries. It was a time in which the local conquered the global. We now live the inverse moment: the global imposes itself over the local. And the global is an imposed construction that implies uniformity, repetition and conformity. I believe these three elements are the mortal enemies of creativity, which is the key ingredient that will assure the health and perdurability of this television genre.

Remakes a la U.S.A.

What happens when remakes are produced in English and geared towards the U.S. general public? (not only geared toward Latinos)

A year ago, U.S. general and trade publications announced with a mix of curiosity and expectation that telenovelas had finally arrived to the U.S.: Newsweek, Broadcasting & Cable, Time, Multichannel News.

MyNetwork TV promoted its new productions Desire and Fashion House, based on Colombian telenovela scripts. And ABC was ready to launch in the upcoming Fall season Ugly Betty, based on (also Colombian) Yo soy Betty, la Fea.

A year later the telenovela landscape in the U.S. is, seemingly, a paradox. On the one hand, we can't find telenovelas in MyNetwork TV (Variety). On the other hand, Ugly Betty is a certified television phenomenon. Acclaimed by critics and audiences, the show has garnered some of the most prestigious awards in television, including a Golden Globe and a Peabody.

What are the reasons for this disparity in the reception of MyNetwork TV telenovelas and Ugly Betty?

Possibly the following:

1.- Because the press presented MyNetwork TV telenovelas as "over the top melodramas" closely related to soap operas, these shows were perceived by the non-Latino U.S. audience as "trash TV". This isn't surprising since that's the way soap operas are depicted in the mainstream discourse, even though some of today's television hits, like Desperate Housewives and Grey's Anatomy have a high dose of melodrama.

2.- What MyNetwork TV presented us as "telenovelas" was really the network's executives and producers interpretation of the Latin American genre. Therefore, these productions included characters and situations that lacked the flavor of telenovelas. Hence, the Latino audience didn't "feel" they were telenovelas and wasn't attracted to them at all.

3.- In contrast, Ugly Betty isn't really a telenovela. It's more of a hybrid between two television genres that Americans (and everyone who watches U.S.-made TV) know well: The sitcom and the series (with its 1-hour format, regimented by the "season" concept, prevalent in U.S. television). Therefore, Ugly Betty's format felt familiar to the U.S. audience, (which generally doesn't know what a telenovela is, and/or despises the Latin American genre).

4.- Ugly Betty also benefitted from being preceded by the success of the film The Devil Wears Prada, which has striking similarities with Ugly Betty.

5.- With very few exceptions, the casts of MyNetwork TV "telenovelas" were conformed by actors perceived as "second class." While the cast of Ugly Betty showcased talent. In particular, protagonist América Ferrera is a gifted actor who had already demonstrated her talent in the excellent Real Women Have Curves.



What will happen now that NBC has acquired the rights for Colombian mini-telenovela Sin Tetas no hay Paraíso (Without Breasts there is no Paradise) (video), based on its namesake novel written by Gustavo Bolívar? Will it become another one-hour, once-a-week sitcom/series like ABC's Betty?

Most probably, since both were acquired and re-conceptualized for the U.S. market by Ben Silverman.

In sum, even though telenovelas are watched in over 130 countries, they haven't been able to attract the U.S. English-speaking audience. So far, this public hasn't have access to real telenovelas, only to remakes that change their essence. We don't know yet if one day the U.S. will watch telenovelas. In this sense, this public is still one of the last frontiers the telenovela hasn't been able to conquer.


PS: Further questions I ask myself:
1.- Why are U.S. television executives so attracted to the stories written by Colombian authors?
2.- Why are Mexican executives so attracted to remaking Colombian and Argentinean telenovelas?
3.-Why aren't Brazilian and Venezuelan telenovelas as attractive for remakes?

Original Stories or Remakes?

This week I had the pleasure of being interviewed by Luis Clemens, a freelance reporter who covers Hispanic marketing and media for trade publications such as Multichannel News.

In his blog, Clemenseando, Clemens wrote a post titled Too Many Telenovela Remakes? in which he describes the current telenovela landscape in U.S. Spanish speaking networks:

All three of Univision's primetime telenovelas are remakes. "La Fea Más Bella" is a Televisa remake of Fernando Gaitán's "Yo soy Betty, la fea." "Destilando Amor" is the Mexicanization of another Gaitán novela "Café, con aroma de mujer". In the new Televisa-produced version, Colombian coffee has been replaced with Mexican tequila. (The original setting of a coffee plantation has been replaced with an agave plantation and agave is the basic ingredient of tequila). "Duelo de Pasiones" is yet another Televisa remake. This novela is a remake of "Flor de las Nieves", which first aired in Cuba in the late 1950s.

To be sure, remakes aren't exclusive to the U.S. telenovela landscape. Remakes ("refritos", as they are commonly called in Venezuela) are present in many television stations across the world which, like Univisión, purchase their telenovelas from Mexican giant Televisa.

In Venezuela, remakes also have a place in television production. In the last few years, RCTV re-made as single shows some of its most successful telenovelas like La Señora de Cárdenas, Natalia de 8 a 9 and Silvia Rivas, Divorciada, all originally written by José Ignacio Cabrujas. In 2006, RCTV broadcast to low ratings a remake of Julio César Mármol's El Desprecio. And before being taken off the air by the government's cancellation of its license, RCTV was airing Mi Prima Ciela, written by Pilar Romero as a remake of her two successful telenovelas Elizabeth and Maite. Venevisión has also produced remakes of variable quality and degrees of success. (By the way, the question why remakes aren't always successful in Venezuela merits a separate post).

As I told Clemens, when he interviewed me, I'm not against remakes. But, I am against producing an excessive number of them. I also disagree with those who see the remake as the only production option, or as their preferred production choice. I firmly believe that it isn't healthy for the telenovela industry that one of its crucial players--Televisa--produces almost exclusively remakes. This focus on remake production will gradually asphyxiate creativity, diminish the generation of new plots and the possibilities of Latin Americans telling the stories of who we are and how we love. In the long term, remakes may produce fatigue in the audience as the genre will lose its freshness.


Last summer Produ.com published on its website a collection of videotaped interviews with key producers and writers discussing the issue of remakes. In his interview, Colombian writer Fernando Gaitán, whose marvellous Yo soy Betty, la Fea has been successfully remade in many countries, and is the inspiration for ABC's Ugly Betty, states that "television can't continue repeating itself, they're going to kill the genre", and adds "the remake is eating up the telenovela".


Award-winning Venezuelan author Alberto Barrera Tyszka hits the nail on the head when he states that the current emphasis on remakes "is related to one of the telenovela industry's strongest anxieties: how to guarantee success".
Certainly, the percepction among many networks executives is that remakes are sure successes. This is particularly true in Mexico.


And, even though Mexican producers like Salvador Mejías argue that they are the ones taking risks "because the issue is that people don't feel it's a remake", it seems obvious to me that the preference for remakes is a telltale sign that the "business" aspect of the telenovela is paramount and more important than any of the other facets of this media/cultural product that so defines Latin Americans.

I alway say that telenovelas have a little (or a lot) of Cinderella, Romeo and Juliet, The Count of Montecristo, The Prince and the Pauper, The Man in the Iron Mask and Ugly Duckling, among other classic plots. Notwithstanding this common ground, Latin American creativity has produced wonderfully diverse love stories with characters we know and recognize. These are stories about ourselves, and as such they must evolve with the social formation and not get stuck in a vicious cycle of repetition.

(Note: Here you can find several video interviews with Fernando Gaitán in Spanish, including the one in which he discusses remakes. Also, through the link Ver más opiniones del Remake, you can access other interviews on this same topic).